


I Still Love You

by MsThunderFrost



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Emotionally Constipated Thor, Established Relationship, Fix-It, Hurt Loki (Marvel), Hurt Thor (Marvel), Hurt/Comfort, Loki deserved better, M/M, Men Crying, Rocket is So Done, Time Travel, loki's fate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-31
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2020-03-17 11:01:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18963922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsThunderFrost/pseuds/MsThunderFrost
Summary: Thor takes the opportunity to reconnect with Loki when he and Rocket travel to Asgard to retrieve the Aether--and Rocket learns some surprising new information about Thor and Loki's relationship.





	I Still Love You

"Is that...?" Rocket had made it all the way down the hall by the time he realized that Thor wasn't lumbering behind him. When he was finally able to track down the blonde-haired oaf, he was standing outside one of the occupied prison cells, staring at the young man sleeping fitfully inside like a Class-A creeper.

"That's my..." Thor swallowed hard, blinking rapidly against the tears that were brewing in his eyes. "He doesn't...He has a hard time sleeping on his own. It'd been so long I'd almost forgotten. Time is...funny like that." He laughed, humorlessly, as a few tears streaking messily down his cheeks. 

Rocket was silent for a long time, before asking, "What's he in for?" He didn't really strike him as 'intergalactic terrorist' material--but he'd been proven wrong before.

"He tried to take over an entire planet." Okay, that was...more than a little bit not good. "And he killed something like one-hundred Terrans. Can't forget that." Thor sighed, "And he brainwashed a few SHIELD agents." Rocket was beginning to wonder if there was  _anything_ redeemable about this 'little brother' he'd spoken so highly of.

Loki rolled over, black hair caked to his face with a thin sheen of drool. He moaned, eyelashes fluttering, " _Thor_..." his green eyes snapped open, "Thor?!"

The corner of Rocket's mouth twitched, "A little less coordinated than I was expecting." He reflected as Loki, graceful as the day is long, tumbled off of the side of his bed.

"What the..." Loki's brows knitted together as he straightened himself out and got his first good look at Thor's new body. "What in the bloody  _hell_ happened to you, Thor? I can smell the alcohol secreting from your pores through the magical barrier." He pushed a curtain of hair away from his face.

Thor frowned, poking at his stomach with a hair more force than necessary. "I may have...let myself go, just a bit."

"The future has not been kind to you, älskare." Loki said. Before Thor could ask, Loki elaborated. "When you visited yesterday, you were about one-hundred pounds lighter...and considerably less hairy. You haven't the skill of a sorceror, or the impulse control of a Terran toddler, so really, time travel is the only logical explanation."

"You're taking this a lot better than one would expect, given the circumstances." Rocket said. The god of mischief turned to him, looking like he just remembered he was there.

Loki smirked, "Considering the fact that  _my_ Thor cannot stand to breathe the same air as me, it stands to reason that something truly terrible must've happened to me for you to be standing here, red-eyed and sniveling."

And Thor was  _still_ crying, "You died."

"Oh." Loki considered this for a moment, before his smirk grew into a full-out smile. "As awful as this probably sounds, I'm glad to see you falling apart like this. After years of listening to you badger on about how disappointed you are in me, how irredeemable I am...how  _unworthy_ I am...I was beginning to wonder if you still love me."

And there it was, Thor's greatest regret. Thor hadn't had a chance--hadn't  _given_ himself a chance--to ask Loki for forgiveness, to assure the raven-haired god of mischief of his feelings. After spending  _years_ thinking that Loki had died on the Dark World, the  _days_ that he'd had with his brother aboard the Ark, after Ragnorak was said and done, had felt like a blink of an eye in comparison. There weren't enough 'I'm sorries' in all the Nine Realms to take back what he said, to change what he'd _done_ , he could never hope to shower Loki in enough kisses to assure him of the depths of his feelings for him, and while his love for the raven-haired trickster god knew no bounds, it wasn't enough to save him from a rampaging titan. And now that he found himself, face-to-face with Loki after five long years of mourning, he realized that words could never hope to convey the maelstrom of emotions that had been festering within him ever since Thanos set foot upon the Ark.

Thor stepped forward, the magical barrier rippling like water as it yielded to him. Loki was standing at the foot of his bed, in a pair of black cotton pants and a loose, emerald-green long sleeve t-shirt. His feet were bare, a pair of elegant black leather riding boots resting by the footboard--if Thor remembered correctly, he had commissioned them as a gift for his beloved's coming of age ceremony; they were in remarkable shape, given their age and Loki's...well, his absolute inability to learn how to ride. His hair was a bit shorter than Thor remembered, just a bit longer than his shoulders. But it was  _Loki_. His brother--no, Loki had ceased being just his brother centuries ago, and he would not let something as inconsequential as five years of mourning rob him of the privelege of calling Loki his  _lover_ \--stood before him, a bit testy considering that he'd just spent the last handful of months in a cage, but otherwise healthy and  _whole_ and looking on Thor with all the love he'd thought he'd lost forever.

And Loki, bless him,  _understood_. When Thor stumbled forward, wrapping his arms around Loki's svelte frame just a hair too tight to actually be comfortable, Loki didn't take the opportunity to pull a dagger out of thin air--while the cell's magic might've prevented Loki from leaving, it did not prevent him from utilizing his own and his brother had demonstrated time and again that, given an inch, he'll take a whole damn mile. Instead, he hugged Thor back just as fiercely...and if Thor felt a few wayward tears wet his suit where Loki had buried his face in his collar, he kindly did not mention them. Thor bundled the slighter god securely in his arms, as if the strength of his embrace alone would be enough to protect Loki from the horrors of the Nine Realms...to protect him from  _himself_. Loki held him back just as tightly, and Thor did not realize how touch-starved his lover had become in the months following his failed takeover of Earth, and it made his heart hurt all the more.

The first moment of perfect peace that he'd felt in over five years was shattered when Rocket awkwardly cleared his throat and mumbled, "As much as I hate to break up this little love fest, we're running spectacularly short on time here, Sparky. We need to get the Aether  _now_."

Loki was the first to draw back from their embrace, and Thor felt like he'd taken a little part of him with him. "Do not fret, Thor. I seem to have a nasty inability to stay dead for too long. I am certain that your Loki will find his way back to you. It's only a matter of time." And then, in spite of the tears that continued to shimmer in his eyes, he smirked, "The sun will shine on us again."

But Thor was too deep in his own thoughts to really be listening to what Loki said, "Loki...I-I love you. Then, now, and always. I just need you to know that in case -," he was cut off as Loki suddenly, forcefully crashed their lips together in a kiss that was more teeth than lips. His mouth ached and he could taste the coppery tang of blood on his tongue...but for the first time in what seemed like forever, he felt at home.

"It's time for you to fulfill your mission, Thor. Much as I think you needed this...you did not come for me. There are others who need you more than I, and a good king -," Thor shook his head, desperately clinging to Loki as he began to pull away. 

"I am not a good king." Thor said, his voice almost a whine. "I led half of our people to their doom. I wasn't strong enough to protect them, to protect  _you_. And by the time I was finally able to take off the sick bastard's head...it didn't matter anymore. Nothing matters anymore, Loki. Not without you." He was not ashamed to admit he was sobbing now.

"You  _are_ a good king." Loki insisted. "Or else you wouldn't be here, trying to set things right." And with that, mustering surprising strength, he shoved Thor back through the magical barrier.

Thor fell flat on his ass, just a few centimeters away from where Rocket was standing. Looking back at Loki's cell, he found...the trickster god fast asleep, tossing and turning and reaching out for someone who wasn't there. The exact same position that they'd found him in when they'd first shown up in the Asgardian dungeons. Could everything that just happened have been some kind of weird fever-dream? One look at Rocket's stunned face told him that that was not the case. He knew that his furry companion wouldn't judge, but he also knew it was quite a bit to take in when he' been under the impression that Loki was just a beloved sibling for the past five years...Thor did not allow himself to dwell upon it for long. because it then occurred to him that Loki had said that 'the sun would shine on them again'. How could he have known what his Loki, in another future, another timeline, would say just seconds before his death? It couldn't be...that was impossible...

"Do you think that he could have been...No, that's not possible." Thor lumbered to his feet with some difficulty, brushing invisible dirt from his suit. He cast one last glance in Loki's direction, before sighing, "Just wishful thinking, I guess."

"Thor, I know that this all has to be super hard for you, and I'm totally sympathetic, I am...But we really need to collect the Aether." Rocket turned to where Thor had been only a second ago, "You have to lead the way, Sparky, I don't--goddamn it, Thor, where'd you get off to now?"

"Mom... _Mom_! Don't go that way! You're in grave danger, mother!" Thor said, chasing after his mother as she and her handmaidens made their way down the hall.

Rocket let out a long-suffering sigh, rolling his eyes. "Wonderful."


End file.
